Abstract and Papers

1ST SESSION
EARLY CINEMA MUSIC

Key note
Prof. Kathryn Kalinak, PhD
(Rhode Island College, USA)

RE-SOUNDING SUCCESS: MUSICAL RECYCLING
IN THE HOLLYWOOD STUDIO SYSTEM

Noticing a visual allusion from one film to another is part of the standard viewing procedure in film studies. We teach our students to pick up on visual references and unpack the meaning contained in them, which/because they add resonance to a sequence and enrich our understanding of the film. But we are not as attuned to the aural in film studies and musical allusions, musical cues from one film that appear in another, largely go unnoticed and often remain unheard. I am particularly interested in exploring those instances of musical allusions where a composer quotes from himself. Like a visual allusion, a musical allusion interacts with other components of a film’s meaning system. Indeed musical allusions can not only reinforce filmic meaning but they can bring to the surface meanings bu-ried deeply with a film and can even bring new layers of meaning that would not exist without music.

Musical allusions occur in film scores all over the world but they were a dis-tinctive feature of film scores in Hollywood during the classical studio era where they became a by-product of the system. Although recycling musical cues from one score to another became a fairly routine practice in Hollywood, the use to which musical recyclings were put to was anything but routine. Composers, more than anyone in the system, understood the power of music and did not recycle randomly. I will focus on three Hollywood composers, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Max Steiner, and Dimitri Tiomkin, and unpack some examples of their musical recyclings in order to unlock the power of musical allusions.

Prof. Kathryn Kalinak, PhD, is Professor of Film Studies at Rhode Island College and the author of numerous articles and books on film music including Settling the Score: Music and the Classical Hollywood Film (1993), How the West Was Sung: Music in the Westerns of John Ford (2007) and Film Music: A Very Short Introduction (2010). She is the editor of Music in the Western: Notes from the Frontier (2011) and the forthcoming Behind the Silver Screen Sound (2015). In 2011 she was named the Mary Tucker Thorp Professor at Rhode Island College.

She came to the college in 1980, hired to teach both in the English Department and in the new Film Studies program. Since then she has gone back and forth between these two disciplines, often trying to bridge them, as in her recent English (Senior seminar) devoted to Disney Film and Children’s Culture as well as English: The West in America’s Cultural Imagination focused on novels as well as films about the American West.

In the Film Studies program, she teaches Film, Introduction to Film, the first half of the film history sequence (1895–1945); the program’s introduction to film study for the major and many, many upper division courses in Major Directors, Major Genres, and National Cinemas. Her area of expertise is film music and the thrust of her research involves how film music operates in variety of different types of genres and national cinemas as well as in the work of individual filmmakers. Her first book, Settling the Score: Music and the Classical Hollywood Film (1992) situates the film score of the classical studio period in Hollywood in terms of historical, theoretical, and musical contexts. That research led her to How the West Was Sung: Music in the Westerns of John Ford (2007), which examined how the director John Ford, in his studio westerns, exploited music, especially song, in defining the geographical and ideological space of the American West. Film Music: A Very Short Introduction (2010) provides an overview of the discipline of film music as a global practice. Finally, she has edited two anthologies: one on music in the western, Notes from the Frontier: Music and the Western (2011), and one on sound in cinema, Behind the Silver Screen: Sound (forthcoming in 2015). Recent research includes an article on the Howard Hawks/Dimitri Tiomkin collaboration and Soviet Film Music in the 1930s.


Maria Fuchs, PhD

(Vienna University of Music and Performing Art, Austria)

FILM MUSIC AS APPLIED HERMENEUTIC:TO THE THEORETICAL CONTEXT OF SILENT FILM ACCOMPANIMENT IN GERMANY OF THE TWENTIES

In this paper I address the theories of silent film accompaniment in Germany of the 1920s against the background of prevalent academic debates about musical form and content, as they were carried out in German-speaking musicological circles around the turn of the twentieth century. I will show that Hermann Kretzschmar’s concept of musical hermeneutic forms the paradigmatic backdrop for the theory of film music. Kretzschmar located the core problem of musical hermeneutic in the nomenclature of musical expression, which incidentally, formed the basis of silent film accompaniment, respectively the method of musical illustration. In order to satisfy the musico-dramatic demands of silent film accompaniment, a broad scope of music numbers was labeled in the cinema music collections. To be used in film accompaniment, music pieces were interpreted for their extra-musical content. The aesthetic discussion about film accompaniment against the background of Hermann Kretzschmar’s concept of musical hermeneutic can be detected in numerous articles that were contributed to the tradepress throughout the 1920s. The most prominent theorist of film accompaniment in Germany, Hans Erdmann, went even to such lengths that he termed silent film accompaniment as applied hermeneutic.

Maria Fuchs studied musicology, comparative literature and philology, and gender studies at the University of Vienna and at Freie Univeristät Berlin. She was a dramatic adviser and production assistant for (music) theater performances in Germany and Switzerland as well as a freelance journalist during her studies. From 2012 to 2014 she conducted extensive research stays at the Deutsche Kinemathek Berlin, funded within in the framework of her doctoral studies. In 2015 she received her PhD with a work about the musical practice and aesthetics of silent film in Germany. At the moment she is working as a lecturer at the Department of Analyses, Theory and History of Music at the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna.

 

Inga Jankauskienė, PhD
(Lithuanian Culture Research Institute, Vilnius, Lithuania)

SOUND DESIGN FOR SILENT FILM: MUSIC FOR CARL
THEODOR DREYER’S FILM ‘THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC’
BY BRONIUS KUTAVIČIUS

Music and sound design, used in silent film, is specific. It differs from the sound track present in sound cinema films. In this case, one speaks about a characteristic synchronisation of a visual and audio levels. One has in mind the relation of the so-called visual steps, i.e. descriptive visual running and its corresponding music here, In the case of silent film, music itself does not have any dramaturgical functions. Sound design can be compared to the image counterpoint. But here is precluded a specific sound design given to preparation for further dramatic fragments shows that music sounds, characterising the actor, the image of which is demonstrated immediately.

The term of sound design in a silent film covers a wide field of sound usage and acting. One should mention that for the description of musical situations, in this case, the catalogue of characteristic situations in music is used; it was widely used in a silent film. As an example, we can mention the music of characteristic scenes: hero’s manifestation, anger, joy, etc. The sound itself can perform the role of the so-called snack musical commentator in a sound film. These are the already mentioned cases when music as if tells about the manifestation of one or another actor. Besides, sound can render the emotional climate of the visual level (fear, concern, interrogative intonations). As it was mentioned, for the description of the silent film in music one used a common description of characteristic situations.

Sound in silent film usually imitates and illustrates the visual shots of the film. This could be said about various sounds effects, for example, related to marching and accompanying clatter, squelch and clack corresponding sounds. We have some cases of contemporary music design for historic silent films. One of them is the music created by a modern Lithuanian composer, Bronius Kutavičius, for the silent film track of the Danish film director, Carl Theodor Dreyer, The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928).

For the aforementioned silent film resounding, the following was used: string orchestra, organs, percussion instruments, record tape. In the latter – quotations of the previously written compositions Epitaphium temporum pereunti (Epifaphy for the Passing Time, 1998) and stage diptych Ignis et fides (2001–2003). Finaly, together with the orchestra, there sound the psalm Black birds in the snow (translated by Sigitas Geda) performed by the choir from the psalm of Hildegarda von Bingen from the aforementioned diptych. Besides, the soundtrack for this film has the extensive use of phonograms and contemporary music hardware.

This film design features to characterise of this piece worth to mention. The music to Dreyer’s film The Passion of Joan of Arc by Kutavičius corresponds to various sound imitations.

Most of these film places are expressed by the time corresponding to one or another episodes of the film in seconds. In some places (for example, p.12 in the score) the musical material handed out in blocks of 1-5 strokes with relays. In some other place of composition the composer was written in the score nearby the episode in which cantor sings (his party is aleatoric-like, without marking the exact length of sounds): in the case of two minutes shortage of the orchestra the soloist keeps singing (some repetitions) until the music episode ends.

Inga Jankauskienė, PhD, has been a senior researcher at the Lithuanian Culture Research Institute in Vilnius since 1990. She graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in 1987. Jankauskienė defended her PhD thesis Narrativity in Music. Operas by Bronius Kutavičius (1996) there.

Jankauskienė has written articles on the history of Lithuanian music in the prewar (1918–1940), postwar (1940–1970) periods and contemporary music. She is the author of the monograph Pagan Avant-Garde: Theoretical Aspects of Music by Bronius Kutavičius (2001, in Lithuanian) and the selection Music of Bronius Kutavičius: Time that Passes (2008, in Lithuanian).

She has been a member of ISI (The International Semiotics Institute) since 1992. Jakauskienė took part in the activity of the International Research Project on Musical Signification and in the congresses of ISI in Paris, Imatra, Aix-en-Provence, Vilnius, and Krakow. There are articles by this researcher in the selection Acta Semiotica Fennica.

Jankauskienė participates in the international congresses of the Humanities ICoN in Kaunas (Lithuania), conferences Principles of Music Composing in Vilnius (Lithuania), etc. She is focused on musical semiotics, narrativity of music, cultural semiotics etc. Jankauskienė is a member of the Lithuanian Composers’ Union.

 

2ND SESSION
THEORETICAL ASPECTS OF FILM MUSIC

Nina Vurdelja
(University of Belgrade, Serbia; Banja Luka, Bosnia Herzegovina)

INTERMEDIA THEORIES OF FILM (AND) MUSIC

In this paper, I want to discuss the topic of music in the film through the theories of intermediality. In various forms of film, music coexists in relationships with other media. In this paper, I want to research how such intermediality takes shape and try to analyze main patterns of expression in this realm. In that sense, trans-, multi- and intermedial relations between music, images and text in film will be discussed. I will try to cover how developments in technology imposed its aesthetics and created new possibilities in intermedia.

I am particularly interested in the topic of performativity and it being conditioned with indermedia dynamics in the film. This will necessarily expand a discussion into the realm of the screen media, also including video and games. Furthermore, I seek to explain the forms of intermediality with an interrupted or broken representation chain. Here, the axes of representation are independent or dispersed but still interact in the audio-visual whole. In the continuum from first sound cinema to today’s filmmaking, I will focus on the legacy of Bauhaus and particularly Oscar Fischinger and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.

Nina Vurdelja is a freelance performance researcher and critic. She holds an MA in International Performance Research at the University of Helsinki and the University of Arts Belgrade. She works on projects focusing on cross media performance that opposes linear representation and conventional definition. As a critic, she is interested in automatic writing and performativity of the text. Vurdelja is currently based in Bosnia/Serbia.


Prof. Antanas Kučinskas, PhD
(Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, Vilnius, Lithuania)

ON SYSTEMATISATION DIEGETIC AND NONDIEGETIC FILM MUSIC

There have been a number of atempts to systematize film music since the early development stages of the genre. Questions of how film music is different from concert hall music, what special features it has, what possibilities of breaking it into categories exist, have been in discussion since the time of early cinematography, and have been debated by cinema theoreticians. One of the most significant (and one of the earliest) classifications of film music is its division into the so-called diegetic and non-diegetic. This presentation will explore the existing and possible classifications and their prerequisites. While classifying diegetic music into smaller sub-categories, the type of music source and relations between music and narrative levels will be taken into consideration. Ambiguous diegetic cases will be analyzed based on extracts from films of Francis Ford Coppola, Otar Iosseliani, Michael Haneke, Mel Brooks and other directors.

Antanas Kučinskas studied composition at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre (under Prof. Vytautas Barkauskas). In 1997–2001 he continued his studies for his doctorate, which was crowned by the thesis for a Doctor’s Degree Principles of Composing in the Works of Contemporary Lithuanian Composers. Kučinskas expanded his knowledge and experience at international forums: in 1995 he improved his skills at the courses for young composers in Apeldoorn (The Netherlands), in 2003 resided and composed at the international composers’ centre in Visby (Sweden). His music can be heard at various festivals in Lithuania and abroad. He has written music for over 30 theatre productions and some films. In addition, Kučinskas lectured at the Vilnius Conservatoire (1993–1998), worked as sound director at the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre (1993–1998), and in 1998–2013 he was its musical director. Since 2007 he has lectured on theatre, film music and music theory at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre. In 2011 he published the book “Theatre and Film Music. Notes of Theoretical Material” (in Lithuanian).


Paolo Girol

(Estonian Academy of Music, Baltic Film School, Tallinn, Estonia)

IS IT POSSIBLE TO MEASURE ‘SYNCHRESIS’ (M. CHION, 1994)?

The papers “On the Radical Potential of Mickey Mousing” (Birtwistle, 2002) and “The Perception of AVComposites: Accent Structure Alignment of Simple Stimuli” (Limpscomb, 2004) together with the well known concept of “Added Value” (Michel Chion, “Audio-Vision, Sound on Screen”, 1994) are the main theoretical basics (but not limited to) of the following question: is it possible to introduce an “Index of Synchresis” to measure the degree of engagement of sound and image as forming a single entity? Richard Raskin (“Varieties of Film Sound: A New Typology”, 1992) seems to introduce a satisfactory categorisation of “Typologies of Film-Sounds” that could be the initial starting point of an attempt to measure the AV relation with an “Index of Synchresis”. Obviously the visual film grammar is part of the approach: elementary cinematograph and editing elements such as kind of shot, scene (unity of location), sequence (unity of time) are integrated as part of the analysis.

Paolo Girol holds a BA in Electroacoustic Music and a MA cum Laude in Audiovisual Composition from the “G. Tartini” Academy of Music, Trieste, Italy. He has been active both as an artist and as educator. His works (audio-visual compositions, soundtracks, music and video for performances, theatre and dance shows, literary work) have been performed nationally and internationally. His works have been selected and granted on several occasions, e.g. Premio delle Arti 2006 for Best Italian Digital Composition in Musical Field awarded by the Italian Ministry of Culture and First Prize in the category works for multimedia, International Competition of Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art 2005, IMEB, Bourges, France. He is a Lecturer of AudioVisual Composition at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre and Contract Professor of Sound Design at the Tallinn University-Baltic Film and Media School.


Dr. Titas Petrikis

(Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, Vilnius, Lithuania)

THE USE OF ENHARMONIC MODULATION TO CREATE ALTERNATIVE EMOTIONAL CONTEXTS IN AUDIOVISUAL NARRATIVE

This practice-based study explores how enharmonic music may support alternative emotional implications in audiovisual media. Virtually reality and games feature various narrative choices at any given moment. Therefore the immediate flexibility in music score becomes practical and functional. In this study, enharmonic music modulation is used to explore how the musical arrival to the same ambivalent chord is convenient to guide the audience in several possible emotional contexts. For the purpose of the demonstration, a short scene from the film is taken, and it ends in four different directions at the dramatic moment. This scene is given several different scoring options that subsequently suggest alternative emotional contexts. The research explores the practical usability of enharmonic modulation in composer’s work, and how it can stimulate successful practice in scoring soundtracks for audiovisual media.

Dr. Titas Petrikis obtained a doctoral degree in film music creation in 2014 from Bournemouth University, UK. In 2006 he graduated with a Master’s Degree from the same school. Since 1999 Petrikis has been actively creating music for film, theatre, television shows, concert programmes, songs and other audiovisual projects. He has released seven albums of his music. The composer was first internationally acclaimed in 2007, when he made it to the final stage of the Volkswagen Talent Campus contest (Berlinale Film festival programme). In 2009, he received the Peer Raben award during Sountrack Cologne 6.0 for music for the feature film Norville (director Andy Marsh). Petrikis’ music has been nominated for award of the Lithuanian cinema Silver Crane (2008, 2009, 2011, 2012). Petrikis has been a member of the European Film Academy since 2012, and a member of the Lithuanian Film Academy since 2013. He has been teaching at Lithuanian universities and has worked across international research and educational programmes. He has created more than 30 films in Lithuania and abroad.


3RD SESSION

CONTEMPORARY MUSIC IN FILM

Prof. Dr. Hab. Andzej Pitrus
(Institute of Audiovisual Arts, Jagiellonian University, Cracow, Poland)

‘THREE TALES’ BY STEVE REICH AND BERYL KOROT – SOUNDS AND REPRESENTATIONS

Music usually does not tell us stories. Yet, several composers still try to explore narrative aspects of a musical composition. Some of the most exciting examples of such explorations can be found in pieces by Steve Reich. In “Three Tales” music is accompanied by video made by Beryl Korot, Reich’s partner and collaborator. The three stories about humans challenging God are at the same time an experiment with samples, both sounds and images. The presentation by Prof. Andrzej Pitrus is an attempt to understand and explain complex strategies of the artists.

Prof. Dr. Hab. Andrzej Pitrus works at the Institute of Audiovisual Arts, Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Poland. He is interested in new media arts, experimental filmmaking and several aspects of relationships between technology and arts. He plays video games intending to research and legitimize them, and teaches his students how to design them. His new book (2015) explores the art of Bill Viola – one of the most important media artists working nowadays. He loves traveling, big cats, Italian wine, listening to opera and contemporary music, and playing death metal bass guitar.

 

Kaire Maimets-Volt, PhD
(Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, Estonia)

ARVO PÄRT’S TINTINNABULI MUSIC IN FILM

Arvo Pärt (b. 1935) has written original music for about forty Soviet Estonian films. However, since the 1980s, more than twenty‐five of his pre-existing concert compositions have been used in over one hundred film soundtracks, not to mention numerous dance performances and theatrical soundtracks. Film directors who have made use of Pärt’s pre-existing music include Paul Thomas Anderson, Denys Arcand, Bernardo Bertolucci, Julie Bertucelli, Jean‐Luc Godard, Werner Herzog, Michael Moore, François Ozon, Carlos Reygadas, Gus van Sant, Tom Tykwer, and Andrei Zvyagintsev, among others. Most often, filmmakers have preferred Pärt’s early instrumental tintinnabuli works – especially those that deliver a sense of quiet, are slow in tempo, feature a small number of explicit musical events, afford instant comprehension of musical elements and compositional structure, and change relatively little in their musical expression throughout the piece. In particular, Für Alina (1976), Spiegel im Spiegel (1978), Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten (1977) and Fratres (1977) stand out as the most popular of Pärt’s works heard in film soundtracks.

My primary aim with this presentation is to share an observation that regardless of a particular film’s genre and actual plot‐level story, and also regardless of which particular tintinnabuli composition has actually been used, there is a strong tendency among filmmakers to invoke tintinnabuli music on similar occasions, with a similar purpose, and in a similar manner in terms of editing this music with images and non-musical sounds. In short, a great number of filmmakers have used tintinnabuli music as if it belonged to a specific musical mood category like there once used to be in the nomenclature of music‐for‐accompaniment‐catalogues in the early days of cinema. The name of this tintinnabuli‐musical mood category would be ‘numinous’, ‘supernal’, ‘spiritual’, ‘transcendence’, ‘sphere of the beyond’, ‘meaning of life’, or any other such concept used to convey an idea of an ineffable unconditional reality which transcends limited, conditional, everyday existence. This presentation will also reflect on the question: How and why does tintinnabuli music afford to communicate such particular expressive meanings in our contemporary culture of musical multimedia?

Kaire Maimets-Volt is a musicologist (MA 2003, PhD 2009, Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre) with a background in semiotics and cultural studies (BA 2000, University of Tartu) and film studies (courses on film history and analysis attended at the Department of Audiovisual Arts, Tallinn Pedagogical University during MA studies at the Estonian Academy of Music). She has presented conference papers, published and lectured on musical multimedia, popular music (incl. film and TV-music), and on the use of semiotics in music analysis. One of her substantial research interests has been the application of Arvo Pärt’s pre-existing concert works in film soundtracks (also the subject of her 2009 dissertation). Since 2003 Maimets-Volt has primarily worked as a research fellow and lecturer at the Department of Musicology of the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, except during 2011–2012 when she helped the Pärt family establish the International Arvo Pärt Centre at Laulasmaa (Estonia). She teaches courses on film music analysis and semiotic music analysis also at the Baltic Film and Media School (Tallinn University) and Institute of Philosophy and Semiotics at the University of Tartu. She is a member of the Estonian Musicological Society, International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM) and Network for the Inclusion of Music in Music Studies (NIMiMS).


4TH SESSION

MUSIC IN ANIMATION, EXPERIMENTAL FILM AND PERFORMANCES

Dr. Matej Gyárfáš
(Academy of Performing Arts, Bratislava, Slovakia)

SPECIFICS OF SOUND IN ANIMATED FILM

Sound is an essential aspect of film, yet one that is mostly “out of focus” of the conscious perception of the audience. It has a number of important functions, genuine only to this component of film language. Animated film is a system of abbreviations, simplifications, accentuations and analogies, thus the diegetic “reality” in animated film is most distant from our perceived everydayness. It still represents that, what we have experienced, yet at the same time it represents in a 62 way that is less acceptable for us than fiction or documentary film. Thus, the functions of sound in animated film are even more crucial than in other film forms. One of the main functions is anchoring – sound provides the animated objects with liveliness, realism, weight, texture and other properties. Sound can also help us to perceive animation as more fluent, or it can provide the simple animated object with a more complex character. On the other hand, due to a looser relationship with a realistic depiction, it is a common practice to accompany realistic visual objects with unrealistic sound effects. Furthermore, sound in animated film is also very important in regard to setting the genre and accompanying the form of animation.

Matej Gyárfáš is a lecturer, musician and sound artist from Bratislava, Slovakia. After completing his MA studies of Psychology at the Comenius University in Bratislava, he did his doctoral degree in Film Sound Design at the Faculty of Film and Television, Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava. He has been an active musician since 2003, working mainly in the field of experimental electronic and acoustic music. He has composed music for several short films, theatre plays, installations and multimedia performances.

Currently he is an assistant professor at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava, lecturing on Sound, Sound Design, Film Sound and Psychology of Film. As an external professor, he is lecturing on the Audio-Visual at Bisla in Bratislava. He has also lectured on Sound Art at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava.

 

Dr. John O’Flynn
(St Patrick’s College, Dublin City University, Ireland)

MUSIC AND SOUND IN RECENT IRISH ANIMATED FILM

This paper examines music and sound in two Irish animated features of recent years, The Secret of Kells (Tomm Moore and Nora Twomey, 2009) and Song of the Sea (Tomm Moore, 2014), adapting, amongst other perspectives, the conception of ‘colour sound’ in animated film (Farmer, 2008). Both productions represent modern takes of Irish mythology and feature original scores by French composer Bruno Calais, as well as existing and original tracks from the innovative Irish tradi- 63 tional group Kíla. Song of the Sea additionally includes recorded tracks by Dublin singer-songwriter Lisa Hannigan.

Following a comparison of the animated films, the paper focuses on two developments evident in Song of the Sea. First, it explores the integration of singers’/actor’s voices into the soundscape, as in the case of Lisa Hannigan and Kíla band member Colm Ó Snodaigh. Second, it looks at the contribution of French sound designers Felix Davin and Alexandre Jaclain to the film’s soundscape, including a consideration of Davin’s sound recording sources collected on Ireland’s south-west coast.

John O’Flynn is a Senior Lecturer and Head of Music at St Patrick’s College, Dublin City University where he teaches courses on film music, popular music, musical techniques, and performance. His monograph The Irishness of Irish music (Ashgate) was published in 2009 and he is co-editor of Music and Identity in Ireland and Beyond (Ashgate, 2014). Most recent conference presentations were at the Music and the Moving Image Conference at NYU Steinhardt, New York in May 2015 and at the Biennial Conference of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music at the Federal University of Campinas, Brazil in July 2015. Current research projects include Mapping Popular Music in Dublin, funded by Irish Tourism, and preparation for a monograph on music, the moving image and Ireland. He is currently completing an article entitled ‘Alex North’s adapted score for The Dead (Huston, 1987)’ for a forthcoming special issue of Literature/Film Quarterly on soundtracks and adaptation.

 

Sandra Kazlauskaitė
(Goldsmiths College, London, United Kingdom)

EXPERIMENTATIONS BETWEEN IMAGE AND SOUND
IN EXPERIMENTAL FILM PRACTICE:
AN AUDITORY ANALYSIS OF FILMS BY OSKAR FISCHINGER,
TONY CONRAD, AND JON RAFMAN

With the establishment of audiovisual media technologies throughout the last century, the relationship between image and sound in the experimental media-led arts has proved to be more heterogeneous than initially anticipated. 64 Whilst music and sound has played a significant part in forming the experimental audiovisual field since the invention of film, the substantiality of sonic presence has been heavily overlooked in the field of screen-based studies, until theorists Michel Chion and W.J.T. Mitchell began to question the audiovisual phenomena during the second half of the twentieth century. Yet, the presence of sound remains to be unleashed. Considering the continuous authoritarian governance of the optical image, this paper acknowledges the importance of sound in relation to experimental film practice. It aims to understand how the use of sonic media has influenced the screen-based practices throughout the last century, and whether it relates to experimental audiovisual media today. In order to identify the aesthetic implications of image and sound in contemporary audiovisual settings, the presentation creates an auditory analysis of the non-narrative and abstract moving image tendencies of the 1920s as well as audiovisual experimentations of the 1960s, and compares its sonic dimension with contemporary gallery moving image and installation works. Whilst evaluating the synthesis between image and sound in an abstract form, the paper aims to theorise the development of sound (as created and experienced) outside the traditional narrative cinema setting.

Sandra Kazlauskaitė is a sound and installation artist, researcher and curator working across the disciplines of sound performance, audiovisual installation, as well as sound and visual arts curatorial projects. In 2011, she initiated an online audiovisual network UNMUTE and since has curated virtual collaborative exhibitions (unmute.eu), music concerts, major sound art exhibition (soundplaceexhibition.co.uk), sound workshops, and interdisciplinary sound art residencies (Kaunas Biennial 2015). Currently, she is undertaking a practice-based PhD (AHRC funded) at Goldsmiths, University of London. Using her audiovisual practice, she is creating in-depth research into the embodiment of sound in contemporary art gallery spaces, questioning how aurality, in its ubiquitousness, affects our aesthetic experience of art.


Irena Alperytė, PhD

(Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, Vilnius, Lithuania)

THROUGH REALITY WITH HEADPHONES

The Rimini Protokoll theatre work “Remote Vilnius” is called a documentary theater. In their productions they refuse to employ professional actors and replace those acting alive. People who have never met in life are given headphones and are bound to the virtual treasure hunt in the manner of online games. Rimini Protokoll offers its visitors a chance to experience the reality with headphones in the real city. “Remote Vilnius” offers you an escape from theater experience and helps grasp the pieces of reality by acoustic (digital) means. The organizers sketch a route through the city to be reached in groups of 50 and create a soundtrack out of streets, parking lots, churches and courtyards. A synthetic variety of GPS navigational systems turns into a familiar voice that through a headset dictates binaural recordings to the pre-selected teams of spectators; therefore, this music makes a personal townscape film. The audience moves around Vilnius by following the instructions of the unrepeatable situations and stories.

The research was done via online interviews to examine the most important moments of this digi-formance added by the in-depth interviews of those who helped create this piece of art.

The conclusions drawn touch upon the implementation of new technologies in the contemporary dramatic arts.

Irena Alperytė is a Doctor of Social Sciences, Associate Professor at the Lithuanian Music and Theatre Academy, Theatre and Film Department, Arts Management Division. Dr. Alperytė has written numerous articles in the areas of arts management and marketing, has extensively researched culture, and has been cooperating with the media.

In 1987, Alperytė graduated from Moscow State University of Culture and Art (Russia), with a degree in culture and theatre direction; in 1998, she obtained an MS in Public Administration at New York University (USA). In the same year, she had internships at the Consulate General of the Republic of Lithuania in New York (USA) and the festival “Art and Ideas” at Yale University (USA). In 2001, she graduated with an MS in Culture Management from Groupe Ecole supérieure de Commerce de Dijon-Bourgogne (France). In 2009, she obtained a Doctor’s degree in social sciences from Vilnius Gediminas Technical University. In 2013, she had a 66 job shadowing session as a lecturer at the Centre for Cultural Policy Studies at the University of Warwick (UK).

Prior to 1993, Dr. Alperytė worked as a lecturer and head of management studies at the Vilnius School of Culture; in 1993–1996 she was a junior researcher at the Lithuania Folk Culture Centre; in 1998 worked as a project coordinator of the theatre festival “Riba”; in 1999–2003, Head of Public Relations at the Vilnius Conservatory; since 2000, a lecturer and later Associate Professor at Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts; in 2003–2004, a coordinator at the International Relations Department, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University; in 2009–2012, Associate Professor at the Business Management Faculty, Department of International Economics and Management at Vilnius Gediminas Technical University; since 2012, Associate Professor at Mykolas Romeris University.

 

Rita Mačiliūnaitė
(Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, Vilnius, Lithuania)

CHANGES OF MUSICAL NARRATION IN NEW MEDIA THEATRE

As the world has been engulfed by the rise in media technologies, a shift in human communication has occurred (web chats, texting, blogging). Hectic life and speedy virtual communication has inevitably transformed the concept of a narrative, i.e., a narrative has shortened. Media technologies have influenced communication as well as cultural activities. Back in the 1970s, they took over world stages, and a trend of media theatre was born. It contains projections, Skype, electronic voices etc. Media technologies have been used by composers as well, and thus became part of a new theatre: theatre in which the media work for music and help to create a musical narrative.

The paper will cover the analyses of several works and will discuss how (by means of media technologies) a musical narrative has been composed.

Rita Mačiliūnaitė is a composer and a performer of contemporary music. In 2014, she was awarded with a Golden Stage Cross for music for the performances “59’Online”, “W(o)men” and “Eugene Onegin”. In 2015, she received another Golden Stage Cross, together with the creative team of the performance “Sand 67 Man”. In 2010, the composer graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre with a Master’s degree (professors O. Balakauskas and R. Mažulis); in 2012, she obtained a pedagogical qualification, and currently is a PhD candidate (research area “Composition principles of musical narration in postdramatic theatre”). In 2014, the Research Council of Lithuania granted her with a stipend for academic achievements of a PhD candidate. The composer had internships in Germany, UK, The Netherlands, Poland and Latvia. In 2007, she studied at the Hague Royal Conservatory. Mačiliūnaitė has created a number of interdisciplinary projects, performances, over 40 acoustic and electroacoustic compositions as well as five operas. She created music for over 20 theatre and dance performances and seven experimental films. Since 2011 she has been a member of the Lithuanian Composers’ Union. Since 2014, she has been working as Head of the Music Department at the Russian Drama Theatre of Lithuania and as a lecturer at the Lithuanian University of Educology.

 

MUSIC AND NEW MEDIA:
COMPUTER GAMES, INTERNET, DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES

5TH SESSION
COMPUTER GAME MUSIC

John Broomhall
(guest lecture of Hull University, Goldsmiths University, Royal College of Music, United Kingdom)

VIDEOGAME AUDIO – HISTORY, DEVELOPMENT AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

John Broomhall discusses the application of sound, music and dialogue to interactive entertainment, leveraging over twenty years’ personal experience as composer, sound designer, dialogue supervisor and audio director in the games industry. Comparing and contrasting with sound for film, he will discuss the jour- 68 ney and development of game audio and music from sound-chip to symphony and how game audio’s past can inform today’s and tomorrow’s productions. As technical barriers fall, game sound creators find they can have all the sound they want. But what should they leave out, and why?

John Broomhall is the composer for such iconic games as“Transport Tycoon”and“X-COM”, and contributed music to key “Xbox One” launch title, “Forza Motorsport 5”. His prolific career encompasses contributions to many other celebrated productions including Geoff Crammond’s “Grand Prix” series, “Fortress 1 & 2”, “Superman”, “American Idol / Pop Idol”. J. Broomhall regularly speaks / lectures about game audio at seminars, conferences and universities. He organises and chairs the annual Develop Conference Audio Track, writes a monthly column for the well-known industry magazine Develop, is a contributor to pro-audio publications Audio Media and Audio Technology (Australia) and sits on the Editorial Board of the academic journal The New Soundtrack.

Ulf Wilhelmsson, PhD
(University of Skövde, Sweden)

PLAYING WITH SOUND – SOME CONSIDERATION WHEN CREATING VIDEO GAME AUDIO

In my presentation I will focus upon the game audio as a dynamic part of the game experience, how it may support the player and make the player interact with the game environment. As a backdrop for this discussion I will give my view on games and playing games as part of a common ground between people sharing a culture. As a case study I will use a tablet/smart phone game developed by a team of researchers at the University of Skövde, which aims to allow sighted and visually impaired players to share the same experience. The game is available on Google Play and Apple’s App Store and is called Frekvens saknad. It is currently only available in Swedish but it will serve its purpose nevertheless.

The game audio has been produced following the method described in my and Jacob Wallén’s cluster model/combined model for analyzing and creating video game audio (Wilhelmsson & Wallén, 2011, Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments / [ed] Mark Grimshaw, IGI Global, 2011, 98-132).

Ulf Wilhelmsson holds a PhD from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and is currently a senior lecturer and head of division at the School of Informatics at the University of Skövde, Sweden, at which he is also a member of the Media, Technology and Culture (MTEC) research group. His research interests lie primarily within computer game studies and integrate film theory, cognitive theory and theories concerned with the audiovisual construction of space and narratives. Lately Ulf has been working with a team of researchers at the University of Skövde on developing video games for visually impaired players. The resulting game is available on Google Play and Apple’s App Store, and is called Frekvens saknad. Early results of this project have been presented in Inclusive game design: audio interface in a graphical adventure game, Östblad Per Anders, Engström Henrik, Brusk Jenny et al. 9th Audio Mostly: A Conference on Interaction With Sound (AM ‘14). ACM, New York, NY, USA (8). New York, USA: ACM Digital Library, 2014.

It has also been presented at the GET 2015 Conference in the paper A Comparison of Immersion between players playing the same game with and without graphics, Engström, Brusk & Östblad. This project has been co-funded by the Swedish Post and Telecom Authority and the University of Skövde.

 

Richard Stevens
(Leeds Beckett University, United Kingdom)

SCORES FOR HIGH SCORES: MUSIC, GAMES AND INTERACTIVITY

Music in video games continues to exemplify many of the roles associated with film and but is often also called upon to simultaneously perform a ludic role, providing the player with vital information required for successful gameplay. This talk will identify the key functions of music within this developing medium and examine the challenges of reconciling the schematic expectations of musical structure with the indeterminacy of interactivity.

Richard Stevens is a Senior Lecturer and Teacher Fellow at Leeds Beckett University where he leads the MSc. Sound and Music for Interactive Games. He has published and presented widely on the topic of Game Audio and Game Audio Education including at the Audio Engineering Society, Ludomusicology, 70 and Game Developers conferences. He sits on the papers review committee for the biannual AES Audio for Games conference and is a member of the Program Committee for the International Workshop on Musical Metacreation. In collaboration with his colleague Dave Raybould he has written two practical textbooks on game audio, The Game Audio Tutorial (2011, Focal Press), and Game Audio Implementation (2015, Focal Press) and contributed a chapter, Designing a Game for Music: Integrated Design Approaches for Ludic Music and Interactivity to the recent Oxford Handbook of interactive Audio.


6TH SESSION

SOUND DESIGN AND NEW MEDIA

Vytis Puronas
(Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, Vilnius, Lithuania)

SONIC HYPERREALISM: THE ART OF AURAL ILLUSIONISM

If a practical definition of the process of painting can be reduced to a liberating action of freely applying colour to a surface – a process that is not a manipulation of existing photographs (as in photomontage) – then motion picture sound is, more often than not, a hostage of pre-recorded sounds limited to layering and processing. Despite recent technological advancements, some of the most liberating sound design techniques to date are the early mechanical sound generation devices employed by Disney, as well as the worldising concept developed by Walter Murch. For many years, motion picture sound designers have employed de-contextualised post-sync sound (Foley sound effects) in order to provide a sense of elevated realism. Ironically, elevated realism is achieved by removing real recordings (as reality is often found to be sonically under-whelming), and re-constructing a fabricated illusion of reality. The audience, however, accepts this illusion as more real than reality itself. Founded on the aesthetic principles of Photorealism, Hyperrealism questions the existence of objective reality by taking into account photographic artefacts and treating them as objects. In this article, the philosophy ‘as seen by the lens’ is compared to ‘as heard by the microphone’. This presentation focuses on the issue of the simulation of realism in motion picture sound. By highlighting some key concepts in the visual arts it 71 stimulates thinking on the current state of sound design. It is a discussion on the power of blank canvas and paint, and on how these concepts relate to sound.

Vytis Puronas is a sound designer and interactive developer whose work encompasses sound restoration, film and interactive productions. He is a graduate of Architecture and holds a degree in Sound Arts from the University of the Arts London. Having worked for London Soho-based post-production houses for clients such as BBC and National Geographic he currently resides in Vilnius and lectures at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre.

 

Tautvydas Bajarkevičius
(Vilnius Academy of Arts, Lithuania, Lithuania)

THE VOICE, NARRATIVE AND NEW RADIOPHONIC FROM BROADCASTING TO THE SESSION

Electroacoustic music, sound art, and broadcasting media have been largely marked by their affinity for cinematography. It’s especially true speaking of genres and trends, which have originated from musique concrete, phonography, recordings of environment or radio art. Contemporary pieces of audio-montage, constructed with regards to linear or non-straight narrative, may obtain various forms of realization, or, not unlike in cinema, they are often called shows. Artists tend to choose “pure” genre less frequently, as they prefer various hybrid, interdisciplinary forms of expression.

The presentation will cover the context of contemporary audio-narration practices, related to composition and montage. It will also bring into consideration several new pieces recently presented in Lithuania: theatre performance Cosmos+, director Kirsten Dehlholm; Apollo’s Insanity, a show for the piano, Lithuanian ethnic string instrument canteles, recorded voices, noises and broadcasting gadgets by composer Šarūnas Nakas; Audiokaukas, a sound performance by composer Arturas Bumšteinas, the radio-play From Axis by Vaiva Grainytė, electroacoustic compositions for a multi-channel sphere created by Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts, Department of Photography and Media Master’s degree students: Vidmina Stasiulytė’s Audial Imagination: inner monologues with the other and Austėja Tavoraitė’s Fictions.

Tautvydas Bajarkevičius is an art critic, lecturer, curator and artist from Vilnius. He frequently contributes his reviews and essays on local and international events, artists and projects to major Lithuanian cultural magazines and online platforms. He has been involved in a number of projects of contemporary interdisciplinary, visual, sound art and contemporary music as institutional or independent curator and coordinator. His interests include interdisciplinary, visual, conceptual contemporary art, media culture, sound art, artistic research, art writing, contemporary music, performance. He is a lecturer at the Photography and Media Department of Vilnius Academy of Arts.

 

Artūras Bukauskas
(Vilnius Academy of Arts, Lithuania)

TO EXPERIENCE OR NOT TO EXPERIENCE

It is impossible avoid the concept of hybrid spaces when researching the change in the sound and moving image interconnection. Digitalised moving image leaves its starting settlement – film – and becomes an ingredient of experience. Film, previously a traditional form, described in this space by different principles, atomizes itself into a number of simultaneously registered and transmitted images, and the mechanism of experiencing it encompasses spatial navigation, physical motion, reading of the meta description of digital objects and events. The progress of two main characteristics in a technological moving image – the speed of registering reality and resolution of image capturing has surpassed the requirements of perception and opened new interpretations for the interpretation of animated reality as well (slow motion and time-lapse). In this way postfilm constructs itself, just like religious experience, through the feeling of digital object forms and virtual connections. What becomes of sound in the context of such intuitively constructed image? Just as in the infancy of the film media it becomes relatively disconnected from image, an option in the real or virtual space. According to A. Sharapov, the sound designer that participated in the research, the experience of sound reaches a stage when the viewer consciously chooses which sounds to experience as music.

Arturas Bukauskas is a multimedia director, who was born in Vilnius, Lithuania. After graduating from the Faculty of Physics in Vilnius University, he entered animation courses in The Lithuanian Film Studio. He continued his educati- 73 on in the field by studying Trick Film and Computer Graphics Directing in VGIK (Moscow Institute of Cinematography), under the mentorship of Vladimir Kobrin. Arturas Bukauskas now works as a multimedia director in his own studio, directs shorts films and audiovisual projects, as well as using his extensive experience to give lectures at both Vilnius Academy of Art and Vilnius College of Technologies and Design.

 

Billy Clark
(CultureHub / La MaMa Theatre, New York)
Andrea Paciotto
(Seoul Institute of the Arts, Seoul)

CULTUREHUB: A TELEMATIC MODEL FOR TRAINING AND ARTISTIC EXCHANGES IN THE PERFORMING ARTS

An overview of CultureHub, introducing specific past and current artistic projects, programs and researches. CultureHub started as an ambitious joint project between Seoul Institute of the Arts in Korea and La MaMa Theatre in New York City. Over the past 6 years, CultureHub has grown into a model for creative exchanges over distance, hosting more than 300 events, workshops, and classes involving over 200 artists and 2,000 students in over 20 different countries. CultureHub has the objective to engage the performing arts world through innovative art, tech and educational programs. Providing students and faculties with a wide variety of resources and opportunities, CultureHub promotes the incubation of creative technology projects, tech-enhanced learning and provides a platform for the world theatre community to explore the Internet as a medium for international expression and collaboration. The heart of CultureHub resides in the network of experimental art and technology laboratories based in Seoul, Ansan, New York, Los Angeles and Spoleto. In the future, we plan to activate other laboratories in London, Shanghai and other parts of the world.

Billy Clark. The Founding Artistic Director of CultureHub NY, Billy Clark has overseen the development of the organization’s artistic, education, and community programs since its inception in 2009. He has produced and curated over 300 74 events featuring more than 100 artists from over 35 countries: he has curated the annual Media Arts Festival Refest; he directed and co-designed visual elements for Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky’s piece Seoul Counterpoint; he co-curated Mediated Motion and directed Digital Duets, just to mention a few.

A graduate of the Experimental Theater Wing at New York University, where he received an Award for Exemplary Work and Achievement, Clark performed with many notable artists including Yoshiko Chuma, The Bread and Puppet Theater, Maureen Fleming and Theodora Skipitares. He has been a member of La MaMa Theatre since 1996 and toured with the company extensively to such places as Italy, Turkey, Macedonia, Croatia, Serbia, Austria, Japan, and Korea. He has also worked as a dancer with Tamar Rogoff’s Dance Company and with Japanese master Min Tanaka.

He is currently a professor at the Seoul Institute of the Arts, has taught at CUNY Hunter College, and has been a guest lecturer at Sarah Lawrence College and NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. He was chosen as one of the 100 Top Creatives in the USA by Origin Magazine in 2015.

Andrea Paciotto is a theatre director, producer, teacher and curator, originally from Italy. In more than twenty-five years of activities, he has directed over 30 different productions, with festivals and theatres around the world: Italy, The Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Turkey, Serbia, Bosnia, Switzerland, Poland, Macedonia, United States, Mexico and South Korea. He has engaged in a very diverse array of projects, spanning from experimental performances, classical operas, large multimedia events, installations and new media, projects with artists from indigenous communities. He has directed videofilms and documentaries, created installations, produced different types of cultural and artistic projects, translated and published plays, engaged in social and community work, and contributed to developed theatre educational programs at different levels.

He began studying theatre at the Theatre School of Perugia University and at the Pontedera Theatre Foundation. Later continued in the United States receiving a B.A. and M.F.A. in Theatre Directing from Brooklyn College, City University of New York. Furthermore, in 2000 he was accepted by the DasArts, Center for Advance Research in Theatre and Dance of Amsterdam University in The Netherlands, for a two years research on the application of new technologies in live performance, for which he holds another M.A. degree.

His international career initiated in 1990 thanks to the encounter with Ellen Stewart, founder and artistic director of New York La MaMa Theatre. He has been affiliated to La MaMa ever since, currently serving as Director of the European center of La MaMa Umbria International, in Spoleto, Italy.

Andrea has lead courses, lectures and workshops on various aspects of theatre and media performances at University of Viterbo, National Academy of Dance in Mexico City, Maastricht Theater Academy, University of Belgrade and Bitef Festival in Belgrade, Academy of Fine Arts in Sofia, University of South Carolina among others. Since 2008, he is an active member of the TECOM, Training and education committee of the International Theatre Institute and a founding member of the Italian Center of ITI.

In March 2014 Andrea began the collaboration with the Seoul Institute of the Arts in Korea, as Visiting Professor and guest artist. He has been teaching courses in devised theatre performance and production, and is part of the CultureHub Research Group on the use of telepresence and internet technology for education and artistic projects.

For more information about conference and topics please contact Antanas Kucinskas (antanas.kucinskas@lmta.lt)